Riverhead cops search for masked armed robber who slashed gas station worker

Riverhead Police are searching for an armed robber who assaulted and robbed a gas station attendant in Aquebogue late last night.

Police said the suspect was armed with a handgun and slashed the attendant across the face with a razor blade during the course of the robbery. He forcibly removed cash from the attendant and then fled on foot in an unknown direction, police said. The incident occurred just after 10 p.m. Sunday night at the Empire station at 640 Main Road.

The attendant, identified by police as Bahri Erdogan, described the suspect as a tall male wearing a black ski mask and black hooded sweat shirt.

At the gas station this morning, a man who said he was the owner of the business but declined to give his name, said the attendant was not seriously injured and declined to be taken to the hospital.

The robber held some kind of a blade between his fingers and used it to cut the attendant’s face, the man said. It was not that deep, he said. The attendant told him the robber has “a gang tattoo on his right arm,” he said.

Riverhead Police are asking anyone with information about this to call their tip line at 631-727-4500 ext. 633.